One Spark
by PsychoSazeVamp
Summary: [X3 Spoilers] It only takes one spark to light a fire. One spark to wreak revenge. Pyro searches for Mystique. NOT a pairing fic!


**Written for the following FNet Alternate Fandomchallenge:**

**_We are all clear as to what the main elements are, right? Earth, Wind, Fire, Water.  
Write about these in some way in fandom. No original work is allowed, nor is Harry Potter. Think about how they're used in...Captain Planet say, or A Song of Fire and Ice, or in those books by Eddings about the gods? shrugs _**

Either way: Elements + Fandom (thats not HP)

Go wild!

* * *

_You are a god amongst insects._

Not the first words that Magneto had told Pyro, but the most important. Those words had heralded his departure from Xavier's, and those words were responsible for the situation he found himself in now.

Alcatraz was coming apart, molecule by molecule.

The specially designed lighters on his wrists were frozen, useless, thanks to an encounter with Bobby – Iceman, he corrected himself. "Bobby" was the slave name. The other mutant had always been so passive, so willing to let the humans dominate him. He had changed in such a short time – probably something to do with his girlfriend accepting the human's poison, their 'cure'.

Screams rang in his ears; terrified screams of fear and death. Pyro didn't look behind him as he ran – not in cowardice, but to serve the need of self-preservation that burned inside him. He was not an idiot; he knew he had no chance of defeating Jean Grey, and part of him wondered if even making it off Alcatraz would bring him safety. If she could destroy an island, what was to stop her from turning on the world?

As he scrambled over wreckage, the land and bodies behind him began to disintegrate. Panic flitted in his eyes, guiding his movements – and a sudden jolt back as his hand nearly touched one of the darts. A flash of silver up ahead – Magneto? – and Pyro redoubled his efforts to get away from the island.

Reaching the bridge, he didn't risk a look back. It was tantamount to suicide, throwing precious seconds away to gawp at the atoms floating into the air. Still, the thought unnerved him… he almost felt as though with each breath, he was inhaling a dead mutant, or worse, a human.

Pyro was amongst the throng now, jostled on either side, pushed forward as much as he ran forwards. He searched for Magneto, almost certain of his survival, but couldn't find his mentor anywhere up ahead. Magneto had gone, abandoned him. A flash of anger coursed through him as the thought hit: he had been left behind, like Mystique.

His hands were wet; the ice was melting. That was good. Soon he could use his powers again, provided that the devices were undamaged. All Pyro needed was a spark.

One spark to begin his revenge.

* * *

"_Erik!"_

_Pyro had turned, following Magneto's lead, and inwardly recoiled. What was happening to her? Her skin… looked human. Scales replaced by pores, blue replaced with pale, naked flesh. Yellow eyes turned dark, and red hair became black, and longer, and human._

_Human._

_The bullet was infected. With their cure. Pyro wanted to end her suffering, bring her poisoned humanity to an end. But he wouldn't act unless Magneto asked him to. Mystique was his superior, or at least, she had been. If anyone would put her out of this hell, then it ought to be Magneto._

"_You saved me," he said, turning away from her. Pyro waited for the moment to come, when he would free her._

_It didn't come._

_And Pyro was the only one who looked back at Mystique as the Brotherhood, and Magneto, left her behind._

_One spark._

* * *

It was difficult, living in this world. Phoenix had been stopped; Alcatraz still remained, albeit on a smaller scale than before. 

Luckily, Pyro was still free – the masses had allowed him to slip away unnoticed by the humans. He was thankful that his mutation allowed him to walk amongst the homo sapiens with ease.

Where to go? The question had plagued him once Pyro was sure he was safe. The first night, he'd slept rough in an alleyway. Several other mutants had joined him, though none of them seemed to recognise him. They spoke of Magneto – not one of them had been followers, though a few admired him – but they didn't know where he was. Their conversation only fuelled Pyro's rage at his abandonment.

"I heard he left, went to a hideaway in the country," said one.

"What makes you think he got out of there?" said Husk, a pretty mutant of Pyro's age who didn't seem willing to demonstrate her power. Pyro understood that she'd run away from her family, who were sent hate mail once her powers had been exposed. If he'd been interested in reforming the Brotherhood, she would have been an ideal candidate.

"You really think he wouldn't? We're talking about Magneto, Husk, not some kid who can't control his powers."

The argument continued; one arguing that Magneto wouldn't have lived, the others convinced he was still at large. Pyro needed a lighter, like the Zippo he'd had before upgrading to the now useless firelighters which he'd discarded in a skip. Magneto had designed them, and made them. Without a means of getting a spark, and creating fire, Pyro was no better than a human.

It made him think of Mystique; the frightened look in her eyes he'd never seen before as they left her behind. How would he feel, unable to make sparks come alive, watch the fire dance around his hands? His power had always been a source of comfort, even when he was at his unhappiest – in Xavier's. The hiss and click of his lighter, followed by the flame comforted him alone in his room at night. Even amongst his own kind, Pyro had been an outcast. Until Magneto and Mystique took him in.

It occurred to him then, that revenge was a dish best served between two.

* * *

Finding Mystique shouldn't have been hard. Now she was stuck in one body, one face, it should have been easy. It was hard to forget the tortured look of fear and cold fury on her face as they'd left her. Pyro had woken up in a cold sweat after a nightmare in which she injected him with the same poison for leaving her: 

_His head ached. Hit with something blunt… was that blood coming from the back of his head? A searching hand came back slick with plasma, and then the sting. _

_It was so strange… inside him, he could feel the fire die, and that didn't make sense, because Pyro could only manipulate the flame, not create it… but he could feel it leave him, feel the senses deadening, the synapses ceasing to snap… the spark dying out. _

_And then he felt so cold. And then feeling came back, only it was different. Less potent, less powerful. Eyes darted around – there, a discarded book to matches. Crawling over, he struck the first match once, twice – flame. It burned. It had never burned him before; and now he couldn't feel it flickering, couldn't catch in and let it course around his hands. It burned him._

_Her eyes were on him, looking down. Snarling lips twisted into a smile. "You're lowered to my level now."_

_Darkness._

Her name – her human name – was Raven Darkholme. Part of him thought it fitting, with her hair colour apparently natural black. Still, Pyro figured that she wouldn't have resorted to her human name, given her hatred of the homo sapiens.

He never was the brightest of Magneto's Brotherhood. And he was still young, not that Pyro's youthful bravado would ever lead him to admit that he was hindered by his lack of life experience. It was why Mystique had the complex missions, whilst he had the easier ones, or was kept by Magneto as a bodyguard of sorts.

At first, he blundered about his search for Mystique. Pyro would literally walk the streets, hoping to catch sight of the former mutant. _Former mutant_. There was still a sense of unreality about it all. His eye would be drawn to any tall woman with black hair, but not one of them walked with the poise of Mystique.

One week. A week of fruitless searching, living with the new lower class: mutants. At times, there were odd looks; and Pyro wondered if any of them knew who he was. They had certainly never been in the Brotherhood, and he'd not seen any other former members. Were they all dead? Was Pyro the only one left?

The thought ignited darkness in his eyes. The ground beneath was cold, hard. He was sitting in a doorway; a skip to the right and dustbins to the left. The smell… well, it kept other mutants away. Whether from exhaustion, or out of fear, or maybe down to the smell itself, the first night from Alcatraz Pyro had run down the alleyway and thrown up violently.

The sheer volume of runners made it easy for the fire-mutant to give the human pursuers the slip. However, the anti-mutant backlash – regardless of the spin the Government were putting on the Alcatraz incident – had caused ripples of discord amongst the mutants. Some wanted to track down the Brotherhood members and make them pay the price of their actions. These were the mutants Pyro was keen to hide away from. Others wanted to join the Brotherhood.

He hid from those mutants too.

No-one, apart from him, wanted revenge on a single mutant. No-one, apart from him, wanted to make Magneto suffer for abandoning him.

And no-one knew where Magneto was. As he tried to drift off in the doorway, Pyro's mind couldn't help but wonder what had happened to his former mentor. Maybe he should just give up his search. He couldn't even find Mystique and she was human now.

"_Erik!" If she had called his name instead, would Pyro have left her there? Or would he have stayed?_

_If she'd asked him to kill her, to save her from her humanity, would he have done it?_

_Would he kill her if she asked?_

* * *

Flicking his lighter on and off, he pulled his jacket closer to his body to shut out the rain. Arms folded close to his chest, head bowed, Pyro made his way through the streets as inconspicuously as he could. 

It was… the next turning on the right. An industrial estate – mostly out of use, and those who did use the warehouses kept to themselves. The darkened sky overhead made Pyro miserable as he trudged over the concrete floor. It was covered with litter – including syringes, strangely akin to the darts used on Mystique. Pyro took care as he made his way to Warehouse number 18.

It was leased to Leni Zauber; Mystique. It was – or had been – a Brotherhood safe house. Pyro's curiosity about any Brotherhood survivors had prompted him to visit old haunts. If anyone else had survived – he'd given up hope of finding Mystique – then they would have headed to one of their chosen locations. Even if, as he suspected, it would be a fruitless search, there was still the chance that there would be something pointing to Magneto's current whereabouts.

The padlock was missing from the door. Pyro froze; it had been removed properly, not wrenched off. That suggested a Brotherhood member – maybe even Magneto.

One flick of the light; his right hand outstretched, Pyro balled the flame up in his fist. If it was Magneto… he would be ready.

Whoever was in here hadn't bothered to clean. The floor was dusty, coated with a fine layer of grime. Pyro's footsteps crunched quietly with each step; and his eyes scoured the room – segmented with faux walls to give the impression of privacy.

Then the world went black, and Pyro fell to the floor.

* * *

His lighter wasn't in his hand, nor was it in his pocket. Someone was flicking it, he could hear them toying with it. 

Pyro's head ached. His hands were tied, and he longed to put one to his temple, as though it could soothe away the pain. A nagging voice in his subconscious urged him to reach out for the flame, because he felt so cold…

And then there was the flame, hovering in front of his face, waiting for his hand to control it, caress it. The voice stopped screaming at him; the panic and fear subsided a little. He still had his powers.

A woman's suit jacket was slung over a chair; Pyro was on the floor.

"You're normal," came a voice which was much clearer than what he'd been used to. Mystique's voice. Once, it had sounded like many people speaking at once; Pyro had assumed that it was part of her power, the 'multiple' voices allowing her to vocally mimic anyone she desired. She sounded odd, with just one voice.

"You're not," he replied without thinking, mentally dissipating the fire. On reflection, it was a bad idea, as it allowed Mystique to viciously backhand him. Swearing, Pyro glared at her, longing for her to flick the lighter one more time, giving him something he could work with.

"You left me," she said.

Fiddling behind his back, Pyro tried to loosen the rope his hands were tied with.

"Where is he?" asked Mystique.

The look in her eyes confirmed her newfound hatred. At least Pyro had assumed that correctly. He hesitated, then decided to test the water to make sure that her ire was aimed solely at Magneto and not at himself in any way.

"I wouldn't have left you," he began. "If you'd asked… I would have stayed. Made them pay. I got the one who shot you."

"It doesn't change anything. You still left," she sneered. "You all left me." She held the lighter in her palm, showing it to Pyro. "Are your little toys broken?" she asked with malice.

"Untie me," he asked, giving up on the rope. Whatever knot she'd tied them with was holding fast. "I'm not here to fight."

Another punch; the lighter was cast aside to the floor, followed by Pyro. He kicked out at Mystique, catching her ankles and tripped her. They tussled on the floor – very awkwardly from the still-bound Pyro's perspective – until he managed to grab hold of the lighter. Instinct took over as – even with both hands behind his back – Pyro flicked the lighter open and the flame rushed between the two ex-Brotherhood members; the mutant and the human.

"Untie me, _now_," repeated Pyro. As long as he had control of the flame – which, now it was lit, didn't need the lighter to sustain it – he had control over Mystique. He left a threat hanging in the air… if he'd threatened to kill her, she could easily have called his bluff. And to have wasted all this time searching for her, and then to find Mystique like this; he couldn't kill her now. Not unless she forced him to.

Unwillingly, Mystique stalked towards him and deftly untied the knot. Pyro maintained the fire, keeping it between them, only cooling it to allow Mystique access to his binds.

Rubbing his wrists to get the feeling back, he turned to face her. Each word was punctuated with the clicking of his lighter.

"Aren't you going to thank me?" he smirked. "I might not have stayed, but I killed the one responsible for the way you are now Mystique."

"Raven," she corrected him. "My name is Raven." Pyro hid his surprise at her use of the human name, but was less successful hiding his scorn.

"Maybe I should've done what Magneto was supposed to do," he said. A flame circled around his fingers. "If he'd had the guts to do it." He tilted his head to one side; "At least you wouldn't have to live like _this_, Raven."

Pyro knew to keep a solid distance between them both. She'd already caught him out once; he wasn't going to give her another invitation to repeat herself. She looked so different… even her body language wasn't as he remembered it.

"Do you know where he is? If he lived?" he asked, deciding to be direct. There was no point in trying to fool Mystique – Raven – she would see right through him.

"He's alive," she answered. "Erik wouldn't lay down his life for another," bitterness threaded through her voice.

"You've seen him?" Pyro eagerly latched onto her words. "Where? When?"

Raven shot him a filthy look. "I haven't seen him. Haven't heard anything from, or about, him." A pause; "He didn't send you here?"

"Would I be asking where he was if he'd sent me?" he replied laconically. Pyro ceased flicking the lighter, though he still kept flames coursing around his right hand. "I said I wasn't here to fight you."

Although it was risky, as a statement of intent, Pyro let the flame die out. She could easily have attacked him again, but Pyro needed to show Raven that he meant her no harm. He tensed, ready to act against her in case she did attack – she was so unpredictable; at least that hadn't changed with the loss of her powers – and waited.

Nothing.

Not taking his eyes off her – Pyro couldn't afford to meet Raven's gaze, it would have given her the ideal window of opportunity to attack him – he put the lighter into his jacket pocket. He interpreted her silence as acceptance of a truce.

"If it's any consolation; and it probably isn't, he left me too," Pyro confessed. "That's why I'm trying to find him."

She raised an eyebrow at him – something she'd never had previously. "To rejoin the Brotherhood," Raven said, lips curling in disgust.

"What Brotherhood?" snapped Pyro, letting emotion take charge of his head. "They're all dead, or imprisoned. He left us all to die!"

"Some of us were left sooner," came Raven's reply. "Or did you think you weren't as easily expendable as I?" Her words hung in the air like breath on snow.

Pyro shrugged, averting his eyes from her. He didn't want to admit that he thought he'd been special, that Magneto wouldn't have left him behind. She probably thought it was arrogant of him to have even thought such a thing, but Pyro had never entertained the thought that there would ever be a time where Magneto would leave him.

Raven waited, considering her next words. "You were looking for me, weren't you?" Pyro nodded, and she carried on speaking. "If you want to find him, you'll need my help."

He looked at her eagerly. Pyro had wanted her help, and had thought that it would have been difficult to obtain, but she was offering to help him. Maybe he'd looked too keen and impatient to accept her offer, because she held up a hand to silence him before he could say anything.

"I'm helping you on my terms _John_," Pyro bristled at the use of his human name, but Raven ignored him. "You may still have your abilities, but I'm the one in charge. No funny business… and I wouldn't think of taking Erik on single-handedly if I were you." She narrowed her icy eyes at him, stifling the retort Pyro had prepared. "Agreed?"

Raven held out a hand; and Pyro shook it: "Agreed."

* * *

Pyro relocated to the warehouse permanently; Raven had already been living there, towards the back of the building. The initial entrance was left as it was; giving the impression of a derelict building to avoid unwanted contact. 

Of course, when one desires no contact, it seems that it is far easier to be found.

Pyro found her lurking around the warehouse, although it was Raven who had alerted him to Husk's presence.

"Following me?" he asked, sneaking up on the blonde mutant. Pyro must have become stealthier – she showed no sign of hearing him approach her from behind. Out of habit, he flicked open the lighter, and waited for her to explain herself.

"You were there… on Alcatraz, weren't you?" Husk asked, spinning around to face him.

There was no reason for him to hide the truth from her. "Yeah. So?" And there was no reason for Pyro to explain himself to a mutant living rough.

Husk shifted on the spot, fidgeting with her hands. Her hesitance annoyed him.

"Got anything to say, say it," he snapped, adding "Or go."

"I've seen him. Magneto. Exactly how he looked on TV," Husk babbled. Pyro snapped to attention: if she was telling the truth – and she had no reason to lie – then this was their opportunity to find him.

"Where?" Raven was behind Husk; quiet, graceful and she stood with a regal poise. It was almost like the old Mystique, emerging from the shadows to confront an outsider.

Startled, Husk turned to face the other woman. He had to suppress a laugh at her naivety and amateurism – turning her back to him left her open for an attack – Pyro flicked his lighter shut sharply to gain Raven's attention. Her eyes met his, and he quirked an eyebrow. Did she think Husk was lying?

There was the slightest of movements from Raven to signal 'no'.

"Where'd you see him?" pressed Pyro, as Husk hadn't answered Raven.

"Only if I can stay here. With you two," she replied. "You've got all this space to yourselves, and I'm out there on my own. I'll tell you if you let me stay," she added, pleading.

Nodding, Pyro agreed. They needed to know where Magneto was now… Husk could be dealt with later. He certainly had no intention of allowing her to track down Magneto with them. How could this girl know what he and Myst- _Raven_ had gone through? If they let her tag along, she would be there for glory alone… assuming she had the guts to even try and face up to Magneto.

"He's staying in Sycamore Street – he was in the park and I saw him, and followed him." Husk was becoming frantic, tripping up over her words. "I wanted to know… needed to be sure it was him. Can't blame a girl for being curious, right?"

"What number?" asked Raven.

"Uh… 590, I think, I'm not really sure," stuttered Husk.

"Be sure," ordered Pyro, flicking open his lighter.

"592! 592 – that's what number house," she yelled. In panic, the blonde pulled off her skin, revealing a body made of – was that _glass_? – beneath. Her chosen name made sense now, and her inexperience of her power was made clear as she swore loudly at having changed form.

"Can I stay with you now? Please?" she asked, glass eyes turning to Pyro for an answer. "I know that's the house number, and I promise I'm not like this all the time, I can look normal-," Raven's eyes narrowed, "-and it's not always glass… normally it's metal and I can help you guys out, I really can, I just don't know how to control this… this _thing_."

"You know, you should be grateful you're not one of them," said Pyro calmly, as Raven neared Husk – who had her back to the ex-mutant.

"I _died_ to protect the power of another," sniped Raven. "You're not worthy of yours." Hands clamped themselves around Husk's head and _compressed_ and her head shattered, not staying together long enough for the mutant to scream. As her body fell to the floor and smashed into a thousand or more glittering shards, Raven looked down at her in disgust, then met Pyro's eyes.

"We have an address," she said.

"We have a visit to make," replied Pyro. He shared Raven's revulsion at Husk's lack of respect for her powers. "Seems like the wrong mutants had their 'cure'."

Raven's eyes flashed yellow. "Their so-called cure," she smirked. Blue scales reappeared over her body, and she morphed into Husk's glass-shelled body, then returned to her natural blue, scaled state.

"We have a revenge to wreak."

* * *

_If you're interested in writing, why not check out _**FictionNet**? ( http / sycotic . org / fnet ) _It's a writing-centred forum (mostly Harry Potter, but as is clear by this story, all fandoms are welcome), so if you join up, say that _**PsychoSazeVamp** _or_**PSV** _sent you._

_This is a companion piece to '**Flex of Blue'** by **Keladryie**. My fic is from Pyro's POV, hers is from Mystique's._


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